Bearing in mind that I know perfectly well I’m getting what it says on the tin when I go into a Transformers movie, and therefore am generally okay with whatever I get, I’d say Dark of the Moon was distinctly better than Transformers 2, except it relegated the female lead to “object for hero to rescue” in a significantly worse way than the first two movies. Really, why not use a dog? It would cost less.
They do, however, earn loads of points for (minor spoilers ahoy) 1: actually getting Buzz Aldrin to play himself, and 2. at least three flagrant Star Trek references (Leonard Nimoy voices Sentinal Prime, see). And for those two things much is forgiven.
But seriously, a Michael Bay film about a kid trying to rescue his dog from evil alien robots would be considerably more exciting and heart-wrenching. Also, why *do* the Decepticons get all the good shit, and could someone please explain to me why on earth Shia LaBeouf attracts such phenomenally hot babes? Because…just no. Really. No.
I think Charlie Jane Anders on IO9 said it best: “After a few hours of seeing Shia get dissed, overlooked and mistreated, the message becomes clear: Shia, as always, is a stand-in for Michael Bay. And Bay is showing us just what it felt like to deal with the ocean of Haterade — the snarking, the Razzie Award, the mean reviews — that Revenge of the Fallen unleashed.” So the whole movie is really about how you’re wrong to not appreciate his awesomeness, and if you speak out against him, he’ll replace you with someone even more vapid.